Episode 060

Published time: 11 Jan, 2015 17:28

Members of the French police special forces evacuate the hostages after launching the assault at a kosher grocery store in Porte de Vincennes, eastern Paris, on January 9, 2015.(AFP Photo / Thomas Samson) / AFP

Bangladesh, a nation of 160 million and one of the world's most populous democracies has over the last few weeks gotten a whole lot less democratic. Last year’s general election in the country was boycotted by virtually everyone except the ruling party and fewer than 10 percent of the population voted. Since then, Bangladesh has cascaded from one violent crisis to the next. Joining Sputnik to make sense of it all is Humayun Kobir Special Advisor to Mr Tariq Rahman, Senior Vice Chairman of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party.

And with the murder of journalists and police officers in Paris this week we appear to be taking a step closer to Armaggedon here too. Or, that's what the provocateurs on both sides believe or at least hope. As the West seems locked on a course of permanent conflict with large parts of the Muslim world we speak with Declan Hayes, a prominent Catholic activist with strong ties throughout the middle east, about the seemingly inexorable path to perpetual conflict between the Muslim world and Christendom.